The Growth of the English Constitution from the Earliest TimesFreeman, Edward A. (Edward Augustus)
History
The Growth of the English Constitution from the Earliest Times
Freeman, Edward A. (Edward Augustus)
Constitutional history -- Great Britain
(38) See Norman Conquest, i. 583, and the passages there quoted. I am
afraid of meddling with Sanscrit, but it strikes me that the views
of Allen and Kemble are not inconsistent with a connexion with the
Sanscrit _Ganaka_. As one of the curiosities of etymology, it is worth
noticing that Mr. Wedgwood makes the word “probably identical with
Tartar _chan_.”
(39) We read in the Chronicles, 449, how, on the first Jutish landing
in Kent, “heora _heretogan_ wæron twegen gebroðra Hengest and Horsa.”
It is only in 455, on the death of Horsa, that “æfter Þam Hengest feng
to _rice_ and Æsc his sunu”; and in 488, seemingly on the death of
Hengest, “Æsc feng to _rice_ and was xxiiii wintra Cantwara _cyning_.”
So among the West-Saxons, in 495, “coman twegen _ealdormen_ on Brytene,
Cerdic and Cynric his sunu.” It is only in 519 that we read “her Cerdic
and Cynric West-Sexena _rice_ onfengun.”
(40) The distinction between Kings and Jarls comes out very strongly
in the account of the battle of Ashdown (Æscesdune) in the Chronicles
in 871. The Danes “wæron on twam gefylcum, on oþrum wæs Bagsecg and
Healfdene, þa hæðenan _cingas_ and on oðrum wæron þa _eorlas_.” It may
be marked that in the English army King Æthelred is set against the
Danish Kings, and his brother the Ætheling Ælfred against the Jarls. So
in the Song of Brunanburh we read of the five Kings and seven Jarls who
were slain.
“Fife lagon sweordum aswefede,
on ðæm campstede swilce seofone eac
ciningas geonge, eorlas Anlafes.”
We may mark that the Kings were young, as if they had been chosen
“ex nobilitate;” nothing is said of the age of the Jarls, who were
doubtless chosen “ex virtute.”
(41) I have quoted the passage from Bæda about the satraps in Norman
Conquest, i. 579. The passage in the Life of Saint Lebuin, quoted in
note 15, also speaks of “principes” as presiding over the several
_pagi_ or _gauen_, but he speaks of no King or other common chief over
the whole country. And this is the more to be marked, as there was a
“generale concilium” of the whole Old-Saxon nation, formed, as we are
told, of twelve chosen men from each _gau_. This looks like an early
instance of representation, but it should be remembered that we are
here dealing with a constitution strictly Federal.
In the like sort we find the rulers of the West-Goths at the time of
their crossing the Danube spoken of as _Judices_. See Ammianus, xxvii.
5, and the notes of Lindenbrog and Valesius. So also Gibbon, c. xxv.
(iv. 305, ed. Milman). So Jornandes(26) speaks of “primates eorum, et
duces, qui regum vice illis præerant.” Presently he calls Fredigern
“Gothorum regulus,” like the _subreguli_ or _under-cyningas_ of our own
History. Presently in c. 28 Athanaric, the successor of Fredigern, is
pointedly called _Rex_.
On all this, see Allen, Royal Prerogative, 163.
(42) See Norman Conquest, i. 75, 580.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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